VALDOSTA — Valdosta State University President William McKinney stated that all VSU operations will be canceled tomorrow.
“Effective tomorrow, operations at VSU will be suspended based upon the advice of law enforcement due to the activities we expect on campus tomorrow afternoon, in terms of the large crowds for ‘Flags Over VSU,'” Dr. McKinney said. “What this means is, there will be no classes, there will be no activities, and only essential personnel will report to VSU for work tomorrow.”
Valdosta Police Department Chief Brian Childress reported that the police department is expecting anywhere between 2,000 to 3,000 people attending the ‘Flags Over VSU’ rally tomorrow.
The ‘Flags Over VSU’ rally will begin at 1:30 p.m. and end at 3:00 p.m. and will be located on the sidewalks of Georgia Avenue and Patterson Street.
Police approved an assembly permit to host the rally.
“We are going to have a lot of law enforcement out here, right now the number we are looking at is about 75 to 100 officers and quite a few of those officers will be under cover in normal clothes,” Childress said.
“We talked to the people who put in permits and we know who applied for the permits, everyone has assured us that they just want to come down here to support the American flag. VSU at the recommendation of law enforcement, because of the crowd that is coming down here, we felt it was best to go ahead and not have the students here,” Childress said.
“Obvious next question, is there a threat to the university? Obviously we are still looking for Mr.Sheppard, he is clearly a threat, lets just call it like we see it. We can’t find him, we’re not even sure he is in the area anymore, but we are being cautious and we are trying to locate him,” Childress said.
Chief Childress stated that this event is one time event and that it is disrupting many things, including classes, local businesses and other schools in the area.
“I am a veteran myself, we want to support veterans. They want to come down here and they want to support the American flag. This is not an annual event, we did it because we know what happened last week,” Childress said.
Due to the large amount of attendees, VSU police, VPD, FBI, and Georgia State Patrol officials will be attending the event.
“All of law enforcement is on the same page, we are not going to tolerate nonsense. You commit a crime you’re going in handcuffs and you’re going to the county jail,” Childress said.
“We are not going to tolerate intoxication, we are not going to tolerate violence, we are not going to tolerate you taking a flag from somebody it belongs to.”
